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An stream so low you barely got your ankles wet separated a village for over four decades. Due to a quirk of landscape, the 50 residents of Mödlareuth, a hamlet bordered by evergreen groves, meadows and breathtaking vistas, found themselves at the heart of the cold war. They had the unfortunate circumstance to straddle the Bavarian region, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Thuringia in the East, a boundary that was demarcated first by a fence and then by a wall. American soldiers called it Small Berlin.

Commemorating Historical Events

Several months after their own barrier was opened, and prior to their nation had reunified in 1990, a collection of local people set about commemorating their history. The work is about to come to fruition: on 9 November, the thirty-sixth remembrance of the demolition of the Wall in Berlin, the Museum of German Division Mödlareuth will begin operations. It was publicly launched by the national president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the beginning of October, but the exhibition was not entirely prepared. Speaking to the villagers who experienced the past era, Steinmeier stated: “You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which ripped relatives asunder and turned local residents into foreigners.”

“You were witnesses of an brutal separation, which ripped relatives asunder and turned neighbors into strangers.”

Bygone Origins

Starting at its founding in 1810, the village straddled the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Princely State of Reuss, a royal family most famous for giving all its male members the designation Heinrich and counting them consecutively by birth. As Steinmeier told the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the way of the inhabitants gathering in the identical tavern, going to the very same church and enrolling their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Following WWII Split

Then came the World War II. The moment they appeared, the Russians erected timber poles by the brook. For a annual period they took over the whole village, establishing their control center in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a image of Stalin and a Soviet emblem. The American soldiers urged them to pull back across the brook. For a period, locals could still jump across, though as limitations became stricter they were forced to present identity papers, although everyone understood who they were, and to come back at evening.

Increase of Frontier Controls

After that, in 1952, came wire fencing and the legal sealing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin previously in 1961, a concrete structure was constructed, with mines, anti-tank obstacles and guard posts. The locals could still view each other by scaling hills, but on the east side signaling and yelling were prohibited. One woman was put on a GDR intelligence watch list for answering “back at you” to a West German local who said her “good new year”.

Exhibition Center Establishment

I was told stories like these incidents by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has spent a significant portion of his working life building it. Residents were polled in the initial phases about how much structure they wished to preserve. They chose a portion on the Bavarian edge, close to where a local resident was able to escape in the darkest hours with a ladder, following which the frontier was significantly reinforced.

Conserved Structures

A pair of guard towers are maintained alongside a collection of exhibits depicting the most dramatic dates in the hamlet’s history. As we walk, Robert Lebegern details the regulations: not a single person could come within 5km of the frontier. Rural residents required special permission to tend to their crops; the husband or wife could work the agricultural equipment but never the pair, in case they attempted to escape. Soldiers stood watch.

Larger Perspective

The boundary between Western Germany and the East Germany ran nearly 900 miles, from the Baltic Sea in the north to this location in the southern region. Berlin is commemorated and documented the most, but in excess of two times more persons (more than 300) lost their lives attempting to traverse it in rural areas than in the big city. the director reminds me that 95% of escape attempts were unsuccessful.

Village Life

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were farmers or skilled workers, who accommodated to living in the ambiguous area between two ideological spheres by keeping their heads down and caring for their farms. They did not endorsed the socialist government nor fought it, the director clarifies.

Tourism

For tourists, however, the village became a type of pilgrimage. Approximately 15k came to visit every year, binoculars in hand, to gawp – and then quickly go away. In 1983, the American president, George Bush, was guided by the national security head.

Twenty-five years after merger, the TV show, a television program about a imaginary hamlet like Mödlareuth, caused new attention.

Current Evolutions

The opening of the modern exhibition center – with a restaurant, boutique, cinema room and large vehicle area – is probable to